Whenever a communications system has multiple routes available for transmitting messages, problems exist with the selection of routes. These problems include determining how to quickly select a route that is reliable.
Most existing routing algorithms are independent of transport state changes. More specifically, retry transmissions are not distinguished from initial transmissions. As a result, many retries may fail before transmissions are sent via a new route.
In a communications system such as Fibre Channel or Ethernet, redundant network components and redundant fabrics are often employed, yet there exists a need for strategies that use these redundant components to increase the likelihood that a retry transmission will succeed.